CeBIT 2013 tech fair opens in Hanover, Germany

CeBIT, the world's leading exhibition in the communication and information technology industry, opened Monday evening in Hanover, Germany.

The fair was jointly opened by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk. During the coming five days, nearly 4,100 exhibitors from 70 different countries and regions will showcase their latest products, technologies and solutions to attendees from 110 countries and regions.

This year, the leading theme of CeBIT is "Shareconomy". The organizer said in a statement that the theme is all about "sharing and the shared use of data, knowledge, resources and infrastructure."

"Even services and tangible products are now increasingly being shared by means of state-of-the-art technologies," said the statement, "This trend is being driven by the many and varied solutions emerging from the ICT industry."

Mobile applications, big data, the "Internet of Things", and an array of new internet-based business models and other issues will also be focused during the exhibition.

Besides exhibition, some 1,000 lectures, seminars and workshops are also set to be hold during CeBIT 2013. In the main event "CeBIT Global Conferences", more than 100 top speakers from the ICT industry will give their insights on topics including smart world, cloud computing, big data management, etc.

Poland is the official partner country of CeBIT 2013. During the fair, more than 200 Polish exhibitors are expected to be presented in a more than 3,000-square-meter space.

Facing competition from the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas and the Mobile World Congress, which just finished in Barcelona, the 1986-debuted CeBIT claimed itself to be top of the three.

According to the organizer, some 350,000 visitors came to CeBIT last year. More than 4,000 exhibitors generated 7 million business contacts in five days.